
Awesome Design Tools
A curated, categorized list of design tools and links to plugins, UI kits and conferences.
- Stars
- 41.7k
- Forks
- 2.4k
- Licence
- MIT
- Language
- JavaScript
- Last update
- 2.3 years ago
- Type
- Curated list
No commits in over a year — check for forks or alternatives before adopting.
What it is
This is a community-maintained directory of design tools, organized by category such as accessibility, prototyping, icons, fonts and wireframing. Each entry is a short description with a link to the tool and labels for free, open-source and Mac-only tools. It is a reference list you browse rather than software you install.
- Search the table of contents for a keyword such as animation or prototyping to find candidate tools
- Find free accessibility checkers such as Axe or Color Oracle and follow their links
- Compare open-source options by looking for the open-source label next to each entry
- Locate the separate plugin, conference and UI kit lists linked from the top of the README
Great for
- Designers looking for a tool for a specific task such as color contrast checking or wireframing
- Developers who want to find accessibility testing or design-to-code tools
- Teams comparing free or open-source design options
- People starting out who want an overview of the design tool landscape
Not ideal for
- Anyone who needs a single installable program, since this is a list of links to other projects
- People who need up-to-date details on each tool, because the README is a partial, truncated snapshot and the repository's last push was in July 2024
- Readers who want plugins specifically, which the README says are kept in a separate Awesome Design Plugins file
How to get it
- 1
Read it online
Clone the repository locally (optional)
git clone https://github.com/goabstract/Awesome-Design-Tools.git - 2
Run it
- Open the repository page on GitHub and read the README
- Use the table of contents to jump to a category such as Accessibility Tools
- Follow the link for a tool that matches your need and check its own documentation
- Open the linked Awesome Design Plugins list if you need plugins instead
- 3
Get the most out of it
- Filter by the free, open-source and Mac-only labels to narrow choices quickly
- Check the license and last update of each linked tool before relying on it
- Use the linked Contribution Guidelines if you want to suggest a new tool
Downloads
Strengths
- Organizes a large number of tools into clear categories with a searchable table of contents
- Marks free, open-source and Mac-only tools with labels so you can filter quickly
- Links to related lists for plugins, conferences and UI kits
Trade-offs
- Being a list, it does not evaluate or test the tools it links to, and the README notes the project's ownership changed when it joined Abstract
- The README provided here is truncated, so the full set of categories and entries could not be verified
- Linked tools may change or disappear, and the list depends on community pull requests for updates
How it compares
| Project | Stars | Type | Level | Updated | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Awesome-Design-Tools (this) | 41.7k | Curated list | beginner | 2.3 years ago | Designers looking for a tool for a specific task such as color contrast checking or wireframing |
| tachyons | 11.7k | Library | beginner | 4 months ago | Developers who want to prototype or build a UI quickly with plain HTML or a component framework |
| daisyui | 42.7k | Library | intermediate | 6 days ago | Developers already using Tailwind CSS who want prebuilt components |
| ant-design | 100k | Library | intermediate | 4 days ago | React developers building admin dashboards or internal business tools |
| bulma | 50k | Library | beginner | 2 months ago | Developers who want a quick, consistent styling baseline for a web page |
| materialize | 38.8k | Library | beginner | 3 months ago | Developers building a web page or app who want a Material Design look quickly |
Stats synced from GitHub. The assessment above was drafted with AI from the project's README on 2026-10-29 and may miss recent changes — check the README before relying on a command. MIT licence: free to use, modify and distribute, including commercially, as long as you keep the copyright notice.